October 23, 2011Dear Sir,On Sunday Morning Sir John Swan gave but a passing nod to our problem that is even more fundament and intransigent than our failing economy. He acknowledged neither its origin nor its implications-----although he did blame the black Community (and the black PLP) for all of our bad (and arrogant!)attitudes and the bad economy , in spite of saying not to point fingers. It is our deep racial divide with all of its inequities that is a greater problem.Black people did not leave the hospitality industry because of the job. After all it was there gracious and welcoming attitude which made it a success in the first place. They left in the forties because the white power structure felt that they were doing so well that they began to bring in white expatriates from Europe to deliberately displace Blacks .D.A Brown used to say that he could give the exact date that it began to happen. Blacks were forced to trainWhite expatriates who then became their superiors. This did not only happen in the Hotel Industry, it happened in many places. Blacks left, not because of the work but because of the indignity of being forced into subservient roles to the white expatriates who knew less than they did. That Sir John should know despite having been Premier of the UBP. So it is disingenuous for him to blame black parents.Black and whites and foreigners getting together on the Beach on Good Friday or anywhere else on any other day does not address the inequities of our racial divide. Sir John did not address them as Premier and the PLP have not addressed them as Government. They did not initially because they feared the white Community. They have not since because they do not have to, neither do they have to be transparent. They now know that a certain percentage of Blacks will never vote for the representatives of the white Community because they know that it was the representatives of the white Community who created the racial divide with all of its inequities and it’s the white Community that has insisted on maintaining those inequities with all of the implications of economic exclusion and demeaning and degrading social roles. The International Companies have taken their cue from the white Community. Lecturing the black Community about their “”arrogance” is not going to change any of that.Sir John Swan and Larry Burchall may have some very wise things to say about the economy and may condemn me for pointing out the obvious implications of the racial divide, but black folks are not listening to me and many of them do not like to hear the truth about black and white any more than does Sir John and Larry Burchall but when they go to the polls they still vote on the basis of their experience and what they know about the inequities of the black and white racial divide. The last PLP administration (with all those PLP Cabinet members) could spend money like it was going out of fashion without doing anything about the structural inequities for Blacks because the resentment of most black folks at the “arrogant” attitude of supremacy of whites and the economic inequities of the racial divide is far greater than their anger at the failures of the PLP.Sir John was Premier of the UBP and no matter what positive actions the PLP, as opposition, may have forced him to do, he continues to have a white perspective and so chooses to ignore all of the inevitable psychological and political responses of the black Community to the continuing racial divide with all of its inequities. He can continue to blame Blacks for all that is wrong, without ever acknowledging the origins and implications of the racial divide, but without its being addressed in some meaningful fashion his “vision” is only a fantasy.EVA N HODGSONHamilton Parish